Crypto ▪︎ Bitcoin ▪︎ Trading ▪︎ News

2022-10-03 20:50:08 Kim Kardashian Settles With SEC, Pays $1.26M for Unlawfully Promoting EthereumMax

Kardashian’s negative experience with promoting crypto assets continues. The US Securities and Exchange Commission brought charges against Kim Kardashian for promoting a crypto security – Ethereum Max. The popular US media personality, model, and businesswoman agreed to pay $1.26 million to settle the charges. The SEC announced on October 3 reaching an agreement with Kardashian, in which she will pay $1.26 million in penalties, disgorgement, and interest for failing to disclose the payment she received for promoting the token. The TV personality will also cooperate with the agency as the investigation continues. According to the Commission, Kardashian received $250,000 to promote the EMAX tokens on her Instagram page, which, as of today, has more than 330 million followers.

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2022-10-03 16:29:02 DOJ Seeks to Block Celsius Motion to Reopen Withdrawals

The Department of Justice (DOJ) is objecting to a motion by troubled cryptocurrency lender Celsius, seeking to reopen withdrawals for selected customers. Since Celsius halted withdrawals in June, the company has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, while the CEO recently resigned from his position. A United States Trustee for the DOJ, William Harrington, on Friday (September 30, 2022), filed an objection, asking the bankruptcy court to deny Celsius’ motions to reopen withdrawals for certain creditors and sell its stablecoin holdings. As previously reported by CryptoPotato, the firm filed for the resumption of withdrawals for customers whose assets are held in its Custody Program and Withhold Account.

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2022-10-03 09:14:01 Coinbase Reports Issues With U.S. Users Depositing and Withdrawing From Banks

Coinbase has released a statement saying it is working to fix issues preventing the exchange users from processing transactions from US banks. Earlier today, the exchange users experienced problems leading to failures for ACH withdrawals, deposits, and buys. The exchange has now acknowledged the issue and says it is investigating. The exchange has also recommended that users should try alternatives such as a PayPal account or debit card if they want to make direct buys on their account in the meantime. It appears that ACH transfers are not the only issues currently affecting Coinbase. Users have also complained about other issues on Twitter, asking when they would be solved.

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2022-10-03 03:03:01 Crypto lender Celsius not seeking payments for outstanding loans

Bankrupt crypto lender Celsius Network said on Friday it is not seeking to enforce payment obligations for outstanding loans during its Chapter 11 proceedings and that borrowers do not need to repay such loans. New Jersey-based Celsius said no interest or penalties will be assessed post loan maturity, in a filing at the U.S. Bankruptcy. In a court filing at the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for Southern District of New York, Celsius estimated its assets and liabilities as between $1 billion to $10 billion, with more than 100,000 creditors. The company has $167 million in cash on hand. Crypto lenders such as Celsius boomed during the COVID-19 pandemic, drawing depositors with high interest rates and easy access to loans rarely offered by traditional banks. They lent out tokens to mostly institutional investors, making a profit from the difference.

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2022-10-02 22:20:09 Cardano Developer Emurgo Undaunted By Bear Market As It Shells Out $200M In Investments

The crypto bear market has been brutal, but it has not stopped development in the Cardano ecosystem in any way. The network recently celebrated the completion of its Vasil hard fork, and even though the price of its native token ADA has failed to move in tandem with the development. CoinDesk caught up with Ken Kodama, founder of Emurgo, at the Token 2049 conference, where it was released that the Cardano developer would be diving deeper into funding for the ecosystem. It was revealed that Emurgo was planning to inject $200 million into the ecosystem for projects built on the network. It has also earmarked $100 million out of this fund to go towards investments in Africa, a region where Cardano development has been ramping up in recent months.

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2022-10-02 17:11:08 Latest EU Sanctions to Restrict Russians’ Access to Crypto Services in Europe, Report Unveils

New sanctions discussed by EU member states amid the current escalation of the conflict in Ukraine are going to restrict European crypto services for Russians. Reports about the tightening have come after earlier this year the Union banned only “high-value” crypto-asset services to Russian residents and companies. The European Union is preparing to punish Russia with more sanctions over its decision to announce partial mobilization as part of its escalating military intervention in Ukraine and moves to annex occupied Ukrainian territories through what are seen as sham referendums. The package will hit trade in the first place, with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announcing intentions to impose a new ban on Russian imports.

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2022-10-02 10:29:02 SEC Must Turn Over Emails About Ethereum—But It Won’t Help Ripple, Lawyers Say

Ripple notched another procedural victory late this week in its ongoing legal battle with the Securities and Exchange Commission, which sued the crypto payments firm in 2020 for the unregistered sale of $1.3 billion worth of XRP—a cryptocurrency originally created by Ripple's founders. On Thursday, a federal district judge overruled the SEC’s repeated attempts to prevent Ripple from accessing internal SEC emails pertaining to a key speech on the regulatory status of competing cryptocurrency Ethereum. Ripple believes the emails will help its case and shed light on the ways in which the SEC has “picked two winners” in the crypto space, Bitcoin and Ethereum, while shunning the rest.

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2022-10-02 04:05:04 Kazakhstan Presents First Draft Law on Crypto Mining

Kazakhstan is looking to regulate and welcome the cryptocurrency industry as it recently presented its first draft law on cryptocurrencies. The Central Asian nation’s recent draft law which seeks to provide the proper framework for crypto regulation covers the areas of cryptocurrency mining. Kazinform, an international news agency based in Kazakhstan, first reported the development Thursday. According to the report, the crypto draft law was prepared by deputies of the Kazakh Mäjilis. The Mäjilis is the lower house of the parliament of Kazakhstan. Speaking on the bill, a member of the Committee for Economic Reform and Regional Development of the Mäjilis, Smyshlyaeva Ekaterina Vasilevna shared more insight on the nature of the bill, its necessity, and the growing need for proper regulation.

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2022-10-01 22:10:07 Block’s TBD Partners With Circle to Create Global Fiat-Crypto Bridges

TBD – a Bitcoin-focused wing of Jack Dorsey’s payments company Block – has partnered with Circle to help expand on and off ramps between the worlds of crypto and fiat. The teams intend to bolster some of crypto’s premiere real-world use cases, from cross-border remittances to stablecoin self-custody. According to TBD’s announcement, the team will begin supporting Circle’s stablecoin, USDC, on a number of applications to make it easier to build on the tbDEX protocol Web 5 platform. The tbDEX protocol is an attempt to create a decentralized Bitcoin exchange, making it easier to bridge value between the fiat and crypto worlds. At present, moving between each requires the use of centralized exchanges, which collect identifying information from their users due to KYC requirements.

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2022-10-01 18:11:01 Indian Crypto Exchange WazirX Lays Off 40% of Its Employees: Sources

Indian exchange WazirX has laid off several employees, the company said in a statement shared with CoinDesk on Saturday. The laid off workers were told on Friday they would be paid for 45 days, they would not be required to report for work henceforth and their accesses were withdrawn simultaneously. The crypto market has been in the grip of a bear market because of the current global economic slowdown," WazirX said in a statement on Saturday. "The Indian crypto industry has had its unique problems with respect to taxes, regulations and banking access. This has lead to a dramatic fall in volumes in all Indian crypto exchanges.

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